Hacker News Reader

vixinon Obama presses to end corporate trick for evading taxes

Socially acceptable to whom? Avoidance is reading the rules written at length by presumably clever people and then acting accordingly to comply with them while minimizing one's tax bill taking all considerations into account. Only a fool would do otherwise.

As quoted "You must pay taxes. But there's no law that says you gotta leave a tip". As to the morality, it's worth considering those of us who try to live within our incomes so we can afford to pay taxes to a government that can't live within its income'.

From a British perspective: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/andrewlilico/100024862/...

'Companies-have-a-moral-duty-to-pay-no-more-tax-than-legally-required'.

vixinon An Idiot's Guide to Inequality

Go read the literature? What does that mean. It means anything you choose to select from it.

And apparently other's people's experiences are only significant if presented by you "I've seen it happen in people that you'd originally think that they had a whole lot of self discipline:"

vixinon Microsoft Looks to Cut Up to 18,000 Jobs

Not bad for a corpse, seven years later: http://paulgraham.com/microsoft.html

vixinon One-sixth of Americans don’t have enough food to eat

True but people forget (or don't know) that calories from fat, protein and carbohydrate are not the same! The metabolic fate of these components explains why this is a fact and not, as stated on many links, a 'suggestion'.

vixinon People Hate Bankers Because People Are Ignorant

Ethical defense? Where do you get that from? Commonsense tells us that the author could not possibly know the moral intentions of that 1% and uses <metaphor> to illustrate a fact known to all of us and relevant to our life in general - that Ignorance can lead one to take the role of prey.

Your other little gem is 'Sure (!) one can argue that most profit in businesses ,,.. results from information asymmetry'. Since I myself must now press on with ensuring my customers don't know what I know, I can only think how uncomfortable you must be in the modern world.

vixinon Higher antioxidant, lower cadmium, and lower pesticide residues in organic crops [pdf]

The evidence for molecular intervention (almost always with positive outcome) of antioxidants in the form of phytochemicals (the ones that have been around us for millions of years) in the biochemistry that occurs in animal bodies is overwhelming as a search in the literature will tell you. I've read hundreds of papers reporting such results. No one talks about proof in science but this is at least indicative though we have far to go.

To ignore the chemistry while waiting for epidemiologists to come to questionable conclusions seems odd to me. Thanks to the countless variables present when people are involved, epidemiological studies are always subject to debate.

Knowing as a raw fact that carbon monoxide irreversibly combines with haemoglobin told me a long time ago that smoking is a mug's game I was likely to lose. I didn't need later 'reassurance' from epidemiology to persuade me give up.

vixinon Expert reaction to organic food nutrition study

Good to be clear that any contrary evidence presented in the future will evidently, be nonsense, because 'chemicals have been prove (sic) better and harmless through science'. Thanks for that assurance.

vixinon Higher antioxidant, lower cadmium, and lower pesticide residues in organic crops [pdf]

Heartening that everyone can read this research largely if not entirely funded by tax payers from the authors' respective countries.

vixinon Emergency phone and internet data storage law to be brought in

' it is also dangerous in its own right.'

vixinon Book review: Bad Pharma

No, he writes what he thinks; as a longtime reader of PG's blog I've not noticed any agenda. He's also been reading Piketty's Capital and tearing P's thesis to bits.

vixinon BBC staff ordered to stop giving equal airtime to climate deniers

An excellent response here:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/andrewlilico/100027585/...

vixinon BBC staff ordered to stop giving equal airtime to climate deniers

A rather grubby device for argument! What kind of evidence do you think is provided by a stasis in warming (no one is now denying this stasis!) when all the climate models predict warming? Models provide zero evidence; they only offer predictions. And they have all failed.

No one suggests there has been no warming at all and a measure of this will reasonably be due to CO2 emitted by man. The argument is about the extent. It's also about spending billions (follow the money! Who, specifically wants to stop that?) to 'prevent' a rise in temperature. Using IPCC figures, it can be shown that whatever Britain does (to take an example) even if it went back to the stone age, the effect on global temperature would not be measureable. Meanwhile the old and poor die in the winter while their increased charges for power subsidize useless wind turbines.

vixinon Show HN: Smart bookmarks extension

What does it do that the Firefox add-on 'Scrapbook' + 'Mozbackup' doesn't do and save offline?

vixinon Tor exit node operator prosecuted in Austria

"its use". "It's" means only "it is" or maybe "it has".

vixinon A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]

As I am sure you're aware, correlation is not causation. But you didn't say it. Plenty of studies suggest that it's how the cholesterol is carried in the blood that matters and this isn't just a matter of HDL and LDL; the type of LDL matters too as do triglycerides. Another important factor is inflammation i.e., high c-reactive protein levels need checking out. And of course other factors may be significant as well.

To put it politely, pertinent questions remain regarding the data which Ancel Keys picked to support his high fat = heart disease hypothesis.

vixinon Why Teenagers Act Crazy

And perhaps your agenda-driven armchair suppositions should be moderated by some of the hard factual data now coming out from fMRI and other observations.

vixinon Digital identity cards: Estonia takes the plunge

'Estonia’s approach makes life efficient: taxes take less than an hour to file, and refunds are paid within 48 hours.'

Exactly as happens when I pay my UK taxes online!

vixinon Physicist offers $10,000 for anyone to scientifically disprove climate change

And presumably ignore cheap tricks and fiddled data on the the other opposite side - a comment not improper given your dismissive tone.

vixinon Cosmic inflation: Confidence lowered for Big Bang signal

Good fun to had building straw men!

vixinon The hidden cost of Gangnam Style

How insightful you are!

vixinon The hidden cost of Gangnam Style

Or presumably, building Chartres Cathedral?

vixinon 'Smart glasses' help fix failing vision

Off topic really but check out Google Scholar for a fair number of papers showing that anthocyanins (colored fruit and vegetables) work positively in terms of eye function.

vixinon Palaeolithic diet: Should we all eat like cavepeople?

I'd need some convincing. http://www.beyondveg.com/nicholson-w/angel-1984/angel-1984-1...

vixinon An Engineer’s Critique of Global Warming ‘Science’ (2011) [pdf]

Just a lone test-engineer? Sorry to be a bit rude but it does appear you're too lazy to bother to look at the arguments. There are plenty of people with distinguished careers in science whose sceptical positions are very well argued. There's Richard Lindzen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lindzen and Judith Curry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Curry (chair of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology) for instance but there are many more if you look. Two websites to check are http://wattsupwiththat.com/ and http://bishophill.squarespace.com/. Both sites invite counter-arguments from 'warmists' whereas you'll find it difficult if not nigh impossible to post a sceptical comment on a non-sceptic site. That tells you a lot about how the science is conducted.

If you want to skip the science and move on to the economics try this one. Billions of dollars are being spent world wide on the basis of lousy climate models in so-called climate effect mitigation. However let us assume they correctly predict the future. The expenditure is demonstrably insane - there is no other word to describe it. Countless billions to lower temperatures by literally immeasurable fractions of a degree! http://topher.com.au/50-to-1-video-project/. And would you like to argue that the stupendous flow of cash doesn't influence anyone? That has to be a fairy story.

vixinon Absurd Creature of the Week: The 120-Foot-Long Jellyfish

'As humans, it’s clear we need to tackle the direness that is global warming' rather assumes we have access to the knobs that do the controlling.

Meanwhile 'ocean surface warming appears to have stalled since at least the early 2000′s. The global average sea surface temperature (SST) update for Feb. 2013 is -0.01 deg. C, relative to the 2003-2006 average.

http://www.drroyspencer.com/2013/03/global-microwave-sea-sur...

vixinon Massive 'ocean' discovered towards Earth's core

An ocean as imagined by Jules Verne in Journey to the Centre of the Earth. A splendid bit of early fantasy fiction. I recommend 'Lost' - the chapter where the narrator gets separated from his Uncle in caverns 70 miles underground.

vixinon Protests against Uber are heating up in Europe

http://www1.salary.com/CT/New-London/Taxi-Driver-salary.html

Not exactly poor but paid like many other jobs in London which probably don't come with tips. Trouble is that the internet has just about surplanted 'The knowledge' and made it available to all.

vixinon Protests against Uber are heating up in Europe

'to give their customers the fastest etc.,'. Nice if it works that way but plenty of customers don't agree that that's what happens. And of course it is inarguably a monopoly.

As noted by one journalist

"If black cab drivers are as good as they think they are, then they’ll beat the new competition on a level playing-field. If they’re not as popular, they’ll have to bring down their high prices. Either answer leaves the consumer better off."

vixinon Effect of General Anesthesia in Infancy on Long-Term Recognition Memory

Your taxes (if US citizen) paid for the research and it was peer reviewed for free by (I believe) academics in the public service but we all know the immense burden and expense involved in typesetting and publishing the results in print or on the internet. At least that is how it appears. The solution to this scandal lies with the researchers themselves.

The price of information http://www.economist.com/node/21545974

vixinon Taking England back to the Dark Ages

Well, as long as we make border crossing more convenient for travellers, we will I am sure, be happy to spend £55 millon per day (UK) for the privilege of belonging to an anti-democratic superstate in the making which ignores referenda from citizens who don't vote the right way in elections.